Blogging as a Business and a Passion #influencemktg

Sponsored by http://innetwork.net. All opinions are our own, as we are always happy to share our passion for blogging!

I love meeting new people, interacting with them and, most of all, helping them. If I meet someone in an elevator, I make sure to say hi and engage in a conversation. If my neighbor needs help with babysitting, I will be there! This is me! I love helping others and rarely ask for a favor. My husband always says: If you could, you will give up our home for others!

This is why I started blogging. No, not to give up our home! To help others and share my experience with them! I don’t pretend to know everything but I believe that each person has something to share with others. Each person can help the others in one way or another! Blogging is my way of sharing my experience with others.

Blogging as a Passion

My son had strabismus, which required multiple surgeries, multiple therapies and endless doctor appointments I wanted to share that! Maybe my experience can help others! So I started OurFamilyWorld.com. I wanted an online stop for families juggling multiple responsibilities. I wanted a place where people can learn from each other, entertain, have fun with their families and live a pleasant life! I shared healthy recipes, activities for kids, health tips! I hired amazing contributors (because I don’t know everything and cannot do everything by myself even if my husband thinks I am a superwoman).

My main purpose of blogging was to provide tips for a healthy lifestyle for the family. Since everything starts in the womb, we cover pregnancy issues, health news for kids and healthy recipes for the whole family. We also provide ways to balance your budget. Studies showed that there is a link between money and healthy lifestyle. Realizing that the two can go hand-in-hand, I found another great way to use my knowledge to help others!

Money management is my strength. I am a chartered accountant. I am proud of what I accomplished on OurFamilyWorld.com. Two of the articles I was really proud of- How to Start a Budget and How to stick to Your Budget-had so much buzz. Readers were emailing me questions and leaving comments! One reader emailed me just to say: thank you!! I was so proud I could share of my knowledge and help the others! It gave me such a great feeling that reinforced my passion for blogging.

One of my proudest accomplishments on the site is the bullying section! My son was bullied at school and the cause is very close to my heart! While we cover bullying topics regularly, we decided to have a special month-long series dedicated to bullying articles. We shared information about recognizing and preventing this epidemic. One day a music star emailed us and shared his story with us. It was so touching!

My team and I try to raise awareness about these causes and the importance of healthy living! We work hard to bring the best to our readers! It is a LOT of work! Between searching the topics, editing, formatting, connecting and finding the right picture or the right recipe, it is definitely a full-time job several times over! My team and I are happy to do it! Why? Because we help others, we have that special relationship with a reader that it is so important to us! It is our passion and we are proud of what we accomplish.

Blogging as a business

Blogging is a passion, that’s for sure. If it wasn’t, our readers would see right through it. Writing great content requires putting your heart and soul out there. We don’t just write generic informational posts. Anyone can write those! We want to provide our readers with a deeper look at a topic and let them know how those topics touch our lives as well. If the world ran on passion for the job, we’d all be the equivalent of millionaires! It doesn’t work that way, though. So for us, blogging is also a business, which means we need to earn revenue to keep going.

Why do we need to sell advertising? Two things: it is nice to share new products/services with our readers! Also, blogging is a business for me! Like everyone, I have bills to pay; I have writers to pay, hosting and expenses! If I don’t sell advertising, I will not be able to hire writers to bring you amazing crafts or share with you the latest news on healthy living. If I do not sell advertising, I will not be able to feed my children! As simple as that! I have an obligation towards them. I cannot let them down!

Blogging is a business for me and for many other bloggers. It is a rising business because bloggers can be influencers in their area of expertise! But even if it is a business, our readers are always at the forefront of my mind and efforts! I don’t want to disappoint. My team and I work hard on that to bring them the best of the best! I am so blessed because I get to share my passion and earn a living with it! Few people get to do what they love! I am lucky!

Our readers and our site are important to every member of our team. So when a company asks us for advertising in any form- from sidebar ads to sponsored content-we do a lot of digging into the background of the company to make sure it adds value to our readers, to make sure it is the right fit for our vision! We value our readers, first and foremost! Vetting our advertisers is extremely important.

Vetting advertisers and influencers with InNetwork

InNetwork is a great way to ensure we’re working with quality advertisers. They have the largest list of high-quality influencers. Brands can find the right fit for their company’s vision, and influencers can rest assured that the company has been fully vetted as a valuable resource. With the launch of OurFamilyWorld Sling Bags for Active Families, we’re now on both sides of that fence! As bloggers, we want to make sure we’re using our influence to help others. With the new store, we also want to make sure we’re getting our new products in front of the right people! InNetwork not only handles the planning and implementing stages of a campaign, they also provide data to companies detailing the influencer’s audience. It’s a win-win for both sides!

While I’d love to make more (who wouldn’t?) it’s such an incredible feeling to blog just becuase I enjoy it but also be able to pay a few bills each month. It doesn’t feel like work to me so that aspect is awesome. 🙂

I too started my blog because of my Fibro and wanting to share my journey but it has become a business of sharing not only health and fitness but many things like product reviews, travel experiences, family tips and advice and more. I am always taken back when a company or pr contacts me to post their stuff for free. Sad, really sad.

Just today, a company contacted me wanting me to “help their cause” by posting not one, but as many times as I would like (giggle) for them. They said it would make me feel good to share their info. So, I replied and said “well when my house payment is due I will tell the mortgage company that just me “thinking” I want to pay my house payment should make them “feel” good and that should be enough. Well.. I got no reply 😉

Blogging is work, no matter how one started or where one is going with it, it is work.

There is some great information in this post. I blog from both sides of the spectrum – I am passionate about it but it is also my job. There is a fine line to walk but I feel lucky to be in the job I’m in and am thankful to be able to do what I do!

I enjoyed your article! I live with children who have peanut allergies, sensory disorders and blog to share my experiences with them. It’s amazing when you get that email from a reader telling you how helpful your information was for them. And to make this a living…

I enjoyed your article. As a blogger, I’ve been approached by endless companies and PR agencies asking me to post their content on my blog for free. They seem baffled that there would be a cost for this service. Their goal is to direct my blog traffic to their own website, and to generate sales for their company from said traffic. Not only do they, as employees, not work for free, but they also do not give away their products for free. Why do they think that I would put in hours of my time for free so they could profit from my work?

Many times when I give my rates to said companies, they tell me they do not pay for this service–and that they have paid writers that do this work. Or, that I should be happy that they have written content for me for my readers to “enjoy”. Obviously this is laughable, and the practise of companies and PR agencies approaching bloggers to do work for free should stop.

That said, I have worked with just as many companies and PR agencies who appreciate my work as a blogger and are willing to pay a fair rate for this service. I think they get tremendous value: excellent written content created just for them, photos that I’ve carefully taken, and social media amplification via my online network. Not only do these businesses appreciate my services, but we have fostered long-term relationships together–and it is a relationship of mutual respect.

Great post! I started blogging for the same reason. I was at a MNO party and there was a new mom upset about her 3 mth old who wasn’t sleeping through the night. I shared stories and situations with her and by the end of the night she was feeling better about being a new mom. She realized that we ALL go through similar things and its part of being a MOM. I began blogging to help other moms realize they are not alone and to share tips and failures that I have experienced with hope that it will make them feel better!

Blogging is a business and without companies like innetwork helping bloggers and brands connect to bring our readers things they want to know about, should know about, products to help their every day lives or just food for thought post. We’d be out of a job. Great post!

I love that you are using your knowledge to help others – and still maintaining the fact that you are still learning yourself. It helps me figure out my reasons for blogging, and I like that I’m not too far off after reading this! Thank you! 🙂

I love how big your heart is and the blogging world is filled with huge hearts. I too have one. But yes although we started to share and open up those hearts, businesses were made and bills still keep coming. I love your prospective on blogging!